


Inside the Silence

by furiosity



Series: Eternal Summer (Right out of Hand) [7]
Category: Free!
Genre: M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-12
Updated: 2014-08-12
Packaged: 2018-02-12 22:24:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2126751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/furiosity/pseuds/furiosity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being the strong, silent type has its downsides.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Inside the Silence

After Rin's twenty-seventh sigh, Sousuke has had it. He leans over the edge of the bunk. "Can't sleep?"

Rin fusses with his blanket and doesn't respond. Thirty or so seconds later, he sighs again. "Why can't I beat him every time?"

"Nanase?" _Again._ Still, Sousuke expected this to be about the upcoming relay, so it's a nice surprise that it isn't.

Rin rolls closer to the edge of the bed, where a moonbeam from the open window shivers with the blinds. His face is half in shadow. "Yeah. I've beaten him already, more than once. I train harder than he does. He doesn't even take competition seriously. Well, not as seriously as me. So why? Why can't I do it every race? I know I'm better."

Sousuke likes that attitude. That's an attitude he can work with. "Probably because you think he's your teammate, even though he isn't. Subconsciously, you're holding back. You want to win, but you don't want your friend to lose."

"I don't think so. When I race Haru, it's for real. It feels more real than anyone else. Ever."

All of a sudden, something inside Sousuke -- something he never knew he would miss -- vanishes, like a water droplet from a hot rock. Acrid disappointment burns deep in his gut. "You can't beat _me_ every time, either," he says, lying back so he doesn't have to look at Rin's face. "Guess I'm just not real enough for you, huh."

"Sousuke--?" Rin's voice is closer; he must have sat up, and Sousuke instantly regrets his outburst. What good is it going to do him to show his anger here? What right does he have to even _be_ angry?

He exhales and turns towards the wall, pulling the covers up over his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Rin. Forget I said anything."

Rin grows quiet, but Sousuke's heart won't stop quaking. What's the matter with him? He's always loved silence: it's soft and dark and safe. In silence, his mind can drift to a place where it's calm, where he understands everything he's feeling. But Sousuke just doesn't understand why Rin's rhapsodising about Nanase makes him feel so awful. 

"Sousuke."

"Just let me sleep."

"Hey. What's on your mind?"

The silence in the room feels downright malevolent. Sousuke knows he's in love with Rin; he isn't _dense_. He just always thought he was better than all those guys who confuse love and ownership. But now that he's been spending so much time with Rin, it's as though he can't get enough -- and it doesn't help that Rin's attention is always a little bit someplace else: his family, Nanase, the rest of the Iwatobi gang, Nitori, the Samezuka team. Maybe if Rin gave Sousuke one hundred per cent of his attention just once, however briefly, it would satisfy him. But Sousuke can't (and won't) ask for that. He needs to find an excuse for his earlier outburst, because Rin can't know how he feels.

"...You stopped writing, and even after you came back to Japan, you didn't call me, not even once," Sousuke says finally. "That's what's on my mind." Not a word is a lie; those things are always on his mind; they're the reason Rin must not know.

Rin exhales, though it's not the dramatic sort of sigh he was using earlier to get Sousuke's attention. "Didn't you stop writing, too?" he asks after a few dozen heartbeats.

"Not much point in writing when I don't even know if you're reading," Sousuke snaps. Regretful, he grits his teeth. _Why am I so stupid?_ "But listen, like I said -- forget it. Let's write this off as another one of those things we won't agree on. I'm not going to bring it up again."

"Sousuke."

"I said leave it."

The part of him that courts his own downfall wishes Rin would argue, that he would give Sousuke some excuse for why he couldn't write -- even if it's a brazen lie. But Rin doesn't even have a platitude to offer him, which is good in its own way. It is proof that they are still honest with each other, even if it hurts.

_Honest?_ If Sousuke's conscience were a person, it would be laughing. _If I'm so honest, why will Rin never know how I feel?_

Every possible answer to that question frightens him.

As Rin's breathing evens out into first, shallow sleep, the silence too grows softer -- and darker. Dark enough to think of places and times where Sousuke can be honest. Dark enough to dream.

[end]


End file.
